Thirty weeks
by Muskatnuss
Summary: After winning the duel for the control of Zaofu, Kuvira takes Korra as a prisoner. She acts reasonable at first -far too reasonable for the usually power-thirsty Kuvira. Maybe it was Zaofu what she wanted all along, maybe it was something else... WARNING: This is a noncon story and it intends to be disturbing. Further warnings in the text. Please proceed with caution.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note:** after their duel, Kuvira takes Korra to Zaofu as a prisoner. First chapter is plot/setup. English is not my first language, so feel free to correct me in the reviews if you see any inaccuracy. :)

**Content warning:** this is a full-on prison/slavery fic. It contains lots of instances of non-con sex and emotional abuse, restraints, and very bad things happening to Korra. Proceed with caution.

Things happened so fast that she had no time to register them. One second she was hanging by her wrists, and then the ground hit her. Everything went black.

After some crucial seconds she needed to recover consciousness, she woke up trapped in a mound of earth. Opal and Jinora's frantic voices were ringing in her ears. She opened her eyes, and sunlight hit her in the face, blurring her vision. She could see their shapes running towards her behind Kuvira, starting to make an attack formation. Korra blinked, and the world went back into focus.

Six metal shapes were hovering above her head, glistening under the sun. It took her a couple of seconds to realize what they were, and her stomach sank. _This is it_, thought Korra. _I lost._

Kuvira stared at her, panting, ignoring the two girls behind her. She took a strand of hair from her eyes, and she suddenly ducked and made a throwing gesture. Another ten metal razors flew to the girls, but, before Korra had the time to scream, they stopped in midair, and stayed floating at an arm's length.

'You two stop!'

Opal and Jinora froze, their arms still upholding the pose. The small tornado they were invoking started to dissolve.

'The first one to move sees the other two die!' Kuvira yelled.

The silence one minute. Korra tried to look around, to the extent that her buried neck allowed her, and she saw the faces of the leaders of Zaofu gathering behind a woman. Suyin.

'Suyin Beifong!' yelled Kuvira again 'It is over. If you want to save Zaofu, step aside and let me take it!'

'Why would I allow you to do that?'

'Don't you realize, old woman? I have already won. The Avatar promised me to not interfere if I won her in a duel, and I did. Let her have her say.'

Kuvira turned back at Korra. The mound stirred, and she could feel it pushing her back and liberating her chest, her body going forward. The earth reshaped itself around her, and she found herself standing, with her body free, only held by two spikes under her armpits. The metalbender looked at her intently, and Korra knew what the other was expecting of her. She had no other choice.

'I... I surrender to Kuvira. She is the legitimate victor of the duel' the words tasted like ash in her mouth. 'I will not interfere further in the conquest of Zaofu' She swallowed again, and forced herself to look at her friends 'Please, Kuvira' her voice broke. 'Great Uniter. I surrender to you. The city is yours. Please do not harm anyone.' She blinked, forcing tears away. Kuvira said nothing, looking at her with a strange light in her eyes.

Her hand was so nimble that Korra only realized what was happening when her fingers had already touched her chest and strength escaped her body. As her legs gave away, Kuvira grabbed her and let her slide to the ground, where she laid on her side.

_Chi-blocking_, Korra thought. It made sense that a fighter learned it, but for some reason she had never gotten around it. Now there was no time to regret it. She could see Opal and Jinora with the corner or her eye, still frozen in their poses.

'Avatar Korra has surrendered!' Kuvira's voice boomed amongst the ranks 'By my right as Commander of the Earth Empire, I am claiming Zaofu under my authority and taking her as a war prisoner. As a gesture of good will, I am letting everybody else leave freely.'

The blades over the two girls started tracing spirals on the air, and went back to the arms of the soldiers. Jinora started saying something, but Kuvira raised her right hand dismissively and interrupted her.

'Let the government of Republic City know that the Avatar will be treated under the Earth Empire conventions, and, beyond the necessary restraints for her power, she will not be harmed under my custody. I intend to release her after the war is over.'

Jinora stepped forward, but Opal grabbed her by the arm.

'How can we know you are not lying?' yelled Jinora, pale with rage.

'I give my word as the Great Uniter that I hold no intent to harm her at any point.' Her voice got softer. 'Korra agreed to this duel and was well aware of the consequences of losing. I have never had anything but respect and admiration for the Avatar, and I promise that she will be treated as a honored guest during her stay with me. Now, please, go.'

The girls stared. Korra did not dare to meet their gaze. She saw them slowly receding, Opal pulling gently at Jinora's arm and looking at the petals of Zaofu, in the verge of tears. They ran towards Suyin, who stood there, unmoving. Kuvira spoke again, her voice gentler.

'I give you three hours to leave Zaofu. Wherever you go, remember one thing: I could have taken your daughter. My lieutenants will accompany you and assist you when leaving.'

Suyin turned her head, and Korra was grateful to not see her expression. The steely matriarch bowed slowly, rigid, her hand covering her mouth. For a moment she looked as if she was going to faint, but she regained her posture, and hugged Opal.

'People of Zaofu! I mean peace to you! If your wish is to go with Suyin Beifong, you are free to go! You are also free to stay, as long as you swear allegiance to me.'

As moved by an invisible signal, two masked men moved from the ranks and went to face Suyin. Kuvira stepped back and started barking orders to the others. Korra could hear the soldiers moving behind her, but she still could not move her head to see what they were doing. The numbness of the chi blocking, that awfully familiar feeling of her body not being hers, had still not receded.

Her thoughts raced, with humiliation, with relief. She had lost, yes, but she had prevented a battle and the subsequent bloodbath. She had been taken as a hostage, a bargain chip to pressure the government of Republic City into giving up the fight. For a horrible moment, despair took her, but her body refused to cooperate. Her eyes stayed dry, and her limp shoulders did not contract in sobs._ I wish I was dead._

A hand made her turn and lie on her back. The face of Kuvira and another masked goon appeared in her vision, dark silhouettes against the sun. The person removed his helmet, and a middle-aged woman looked indifferently at her.

'Check that she is not badly hurt, please, Yanlin' Kuvira sounded... concerned? 'I do not want to hurt her when we put on the restraints'

The woman knelt at her side, and started running her fingers through her arms and legs. Her touch was swift and professional, and she barely looked at her. Korra could feel the subtle energy of her hands on her skin: the woman was a waterbender. She grabbed her by the chin, eliciting a soft moan of protest, and made her turn her head.

'She is not severely injured, Great Uniter' the woman declared in a flat voice 'Some bruises, scratches, and two contused ribs, but there is no damage to the organs, not to the spine. She will be sore for some days, and I recommend that she does not walk too much, but she should recover quickly.'

'Thank you, healer.' Kuvira bowed her head, making Korra blink in incredulity, and the other woman returned the gesture. 'You are dismissed'. Kuvira knelt to Korra's side as the other woman left, and a thin smile appeared in her lips.

'Now, Avatar, this will not hurt, but it may be a little cold' she took a lump of black metal from a hidden pouch in her armor, that Korra recognized as meteor iron. The black substance hovered over Kuvira's palm, and split into several tiny lumps. Carefully, Kuvira positioned them over her enemy's body, and made them descend.

The first ones landed on the inner part of Korra's elbows and wrists, where they wiggled until they became bracelets. Other went on the base of her neck, which made her gasp -it was really cold, colder than it should for such a warm day. Others went into her clothes and curled into tight shapes in her collarbones, her navel and her hips, where they solidified.

'Partial chi blocking' her voice was now silky 'It took me a lot of experimenting to get it right, but it works. As long as you are wearing this, you are not doing any bending.'

Korra tried to protest. She wanted to hit Kuvira, but strength was still eluding her. The other turned her around slowly, first to her side, and then to her belly. Without an outlet to go out, rage choked her, but she could only babble and drool. Her spit, mixed with dust, stained her cheek. She closed her eyes in impotence.

The other woman took her wrists carefully, and closed unseen metal cuffs in her. They were cold, and heavy. _Probably platinum_, thought Korra. Kuvira would not take any chances with her. Another set of manacles took her ankles.

The touch of metal brought back to her awful memories, of the days spent with Zaheer and the Red Lotus. She remembered being restrained and afraid by people who wanted nothing but to hurt her, being helpless. Panic rushed in for the first time, taking the air from her lungs and blackening her vision. A thin sound escaped her throat.

A hand on her shoulder brought her back to reality. It was Kuvira, still kneeling beside her. 'There, there' she said softly. 'You took the right decision. You can rest.'

Korra could say nothing, only concentrate on steadying her breath again. She wanted to jump at Kuvira, to hurt her more than nothing in the world, but the other just looked at her, with a distant smile, stood up and left.

The following hours passed like a bad dream. The camp exploded with activity. Raising her head, Korra could see that Kuvira was upholding her promise: Suyin and the others were leaving unharmede, escorted by Kuvira's troops. Some of the citizens appeared to be with her. Korra wondered why she was not herself there, to taunt her old enemy about her victory, but the Great Uniter did not seem to be in the mood for it. She ran around her troops, giving orders to her subordinates regarding a myriad of details about the taking of Zaofu. Korra only half-listened, lying on a tarpaulin that someone put for her on the ground. Nobody paid any attention to her, not even the soldiers taking guard.

Movement came back gradually to her, as well as the pain from innumerable injuries in the battle. Her left side, that had taken most blows, felt like an enormous bruise, and she could see that her left arm was covered in scratches. Her knee was pulsating slowly, and she suspected that the waterbender had overlooked something in there, maybe deliberately. At some point, her stomach rumbled, and a very uncomfortable pressure started to build up in her bladder.

The restraints at least were comfortable, a small mercy for all the rest. Korra thought bitterly that now Kuvira could afford that kind of gestures now. The manacles in her wrists were not pushed together, but connected by a chain as long as the width of her hips, which allowed her to relieve some of the tension in her back. That chain was linked to another that reached the manacles on her feet, which were joined the same way. If she stood, she could probably walk, but with small steps. She lied in the sun, curled up on herself, for what it seemed to be forever. The world around her seemed to be very far away.

Reality came back suddenly as two female masked soldiers appeared and grabbed her to make her stand up. Her body protested, but she did not allow her pain to show. Kuvira was at some distance, marching towards the city, and the women pointed at her. Determined to keep her dignity, she started walking with them towards the city.

Her knee hurt when she walked, to the point that she had to visibly limp. The women marched with her, pushing her when she was too slow. She could see a crowd gathering on the other side of the doors, ready to greet the Great Uniter and see the defeated Avatar. With her head up, she entered the dome.

It was cooler inside, and the city still had its characteristic mineral smell. Most of Zaofu had stayed. It was their home, after all, and they already knew Kuvira. She was marching at the front, saluting the crowd, stopping at some points to shake hands and address some people by their first names. She received some tentative cheers by the crowd. Korra tried not to imagine how Suyin must have been feeling in that moment, with her own city giving itself away to the usurper.

They marched down the street towards the main square. People fell silent when they saw the Avatar in chains, and she tried to avoid the gaze of the familiar faces. They brought her into one of the administrative buildings. Kuvira ignored her, except for a glance in her direction and a whispered order. Korra was reluctantly grateful when, some minutes later, a scared-looking man brought a chair for her.

She also stayed there for a while, in an empty metal room in which people came and left. She could see local dignitaries as well as servants rushing through with the green banners of the Earth Empire. The cold made her shiver, but her skin felt hot. At some point they allowed her a precious minute in the privy, while one of the women stood by the door.

In the mirror, a beaten woman stared back at her. Her left cheek was swollen, and had a nasty cut. Her skin was red at some points, and Korra realized that she must had been sunburned after the hours under the sun, which had not happened since she was a child. She arranged her clothes as well as her restraints allowed her, and left.

She was taken again to the main square, where Kuvira was giving a speech to the inhabitants of Zaofu, and they made her stand behind her in the podium. Kuvira was looking impeccable again, her hair neatly braid, with shiny new armor, speaking in a clear and hopeful voice about an orderly future where the spirit of metal city would be carried over the world. She talked without a trace of irony about the integrity the Avatar, who had been honorably defeated. An untrained eye would have not believed that she had been in a duel that very day, but some details in her posture, and rigidity in her right arm, betrayed her discomfort.

Korra half-listened to her speech, while her mind raced. She did not understand. This Kuvira, so restrained and rational, talking about peace accords and future collaborations. This Kuvira, merciful and gentle, not interested in gloating over her fallen enemies. Who was she?

Could she be reasoned with?

Maybe it was Zaofu what she had wanted all along. Her hometown, where she arrived when she was nothing but a child. Maybe now her thirst for power would be quenched. But then she turned around and gave a brief look at Korra that sent a chill through her spine.

She steadied herself, pushed her chin up and her shoulders forward, although they hurt. The people of Zaofu were seeing her defeated, yes, but not beaten. Despite her dirty clothes and her shackles, she had not lost herself. She was still Korra. She wondered what Tenzin would advise her to do. Probably wait, she realized. Stay calm and see what could she salvage from the situation. At some point, Kuvira would try to talk to her, and then she would gauge the situation. Maybe she could still save Republic City.

The cheers of the crowd became deafeningly loud, and slowly died away. Dusk was setting outside, and the petals started to close, like every night, with a dull metallic whirl. She allowed the guards to led her away from the crowd, back into the room. After a while, they put her in a vehicle that went into old Suyin's garden.

The guard pushed her out of the car. Korra landed in her bad knee, which made her almost fall, but the other woman grabbed her elbow and helped her up. Without talking, she led her down one of the lateral paths, to the rooms of the sentinels. They walked slowly. The temperature in the metal garden had dropped with the sunset, and it was oddly quiet.

Korra was tired, more than she had been in years, maybe more than in her own life. Maybe it was an effect of the metal rings that were blocking her chi. She realized where they were heading before even seeing the place, a small building that she had overlooked many times, protruding from the side of Suyin's house. It had been a dwelling for Suyin's best soldiers, and she knew who else had to have been living there.

They arrived to the door, and the soldier knocked. Kuvira opened, still in her battle uniform, and she exchanged some quick words with the guard. Korra did her best to maintain a neutral expression, but her heart was beating so fast that she could feel it in her eardrums. Now it was the moment to speak with her, to face her enemy.

'Kuvira, what...'

She could not finish the sentence. As the door closed, a metal band closed over her eyes, and another one clamped her mouth shut.


	2. Chapter 2: showing the ropes

Korra reacted fast. Her reflexes took over, making her crouch to adopt a fighting stance, but the restraints did not allow her to flex her arms. She could feel air swooshing -was Kuvira throwing something at her?- so she ducked, and turned.

Her first instinct was to bend air or fire, the elements she had at hand, but her bender senses were numbed. So the partial chi-blocking worked. She was feeling just like that horrible time with Amon, when she thought she would be stripped of her bending forever. She fought the panic rising from her stomach.

Kuvira was playing some kind of sick game. She did not had time to check the room properly, but it was probably small, and she should count on furniture. It suited her small range of movement, in any case. She could not kick, throw or punch. She could not put on a decent defensive pose. She was blinded, as well as gagged, so no biting.

It did not matter. Her body, an instrument attuned to fighting, was following the steps as if it were a dance. She walked backwards, in small, zig-zagging steps, until she reached a wall, and stayed close to it, half-turned, protecting her hurt left side. If Kuvira was going to kill her, she would not go down without a fight. The coward, that had to blind her to face her again. She almost had her last time! Thoughts kept racing through her head, hiding to herself how terrified she was.

No more blows came. Korra panted, the rush of adrenaline had left her shaky, and cold. She was breathing shallowly through her nose, and she wished she could use her mouth.

'You were acting so docile' Korra heard. Kuvira's voice had recovered its usual smugness. 'I was afraid it really took so little to break you.'

Something cold brushed by Korra's arm. She jumped, and tripped on something, which made her almost fall. As she recovered, another two objects touched lightly her ankles, just above the cuffs.

Korra did not move. Kuvira was taunting her, and counting on her getting scared and trying to take the metal fleas from her skin. She did not try to shake them off as several more landed on her arms and shoulders, and started running down her limbs. What was she expecting? That she, the Avatar, would shriek like a damsel? She steadied herself on the wall, reassured by the solid touch of the metal. Two of the fleas had slipped under the protective bandages of her forearms, and she could feel them changing shape. _What the...?_

Fresh air touched her exposed skin. The fleas were cutting into the fabric of the bandages like scalpels, quietly but fast. She felt them falling softly, just as the other fleas started cutting into her breeches and her shirt. Clothes peeled from her, leaving her only with her underpants and the tight binder she had brought to the battle.

Korra steadied herself, trying to stay stoic, when the chain that linked her wrists and ankles snapped with a clinking sound. _So, not platinum after all_, she thought incongruously. Before she could react, the cuffs started pulling in separate directions, steering her like a puppet.

With slow, jerky movements, the chains dragged her to a flat, soft surface -a bed- and made her fall on it spread-eagled. Then, the four of them pulled her limbs to the corners of the bed. She could hear the chains rolling themselves into something, probably bedposts.

Even tied up, Korra was strong. She thrashed, to the point that the wooden frame of the bed moved a little, but the post held. After a while she gave up, exhausted.

A small part of her mind had kept fighting the panic, and was starting to make itself heard. Kuvira wanted to extract information from her about Republic City. She did not dare to physically hurt such a precious hostage so she was trying to intimidate her into giving up precious data about the resources and the power relationships. Joke was on her, thought Korra bitterly. In her role of the Avatar, she had been a symbol and fought for her people, but she had rarely been involved in the decision-making processes. _A better hostage would have been Asami. _The thought gave her an odd pang of pain.

She gasped, trying to get some air, and the metal band in her mouth changed shape. She opened her mouth triumphantly at the unexpected freedom, but the piece went into it, and changed again. Korra found herself biting into a metal rod. A gurgling sound of surprise left her throat.

Kuvira's voice came suddenly from her left, cold and detached.

'Do not bite too hard, or you will chip your teeth. Now I will start asking questions, and you will reply saying "yes" or "no" with your head. You will not like what will happen if you don't answer. Did you understand?'

Korra nodded, and her heart pounding in her chest. She had been right. She only had to endure the interrogation for a while, until she convinced her of her ignorance. _Raava give me strength_.

To her dismay, the little bits of metal running through her skin went into what remained of her clothes, and started cutting again with the dry ripping song of fabric. She felt Kuvira's fingers peeling the rags away, and she shivered at her touch. She had not realized the reassurance that her underwear gave her until she found herself completely naked and exposed.

'So, did you fuck the firebender?'

Korra stayed in numb misbelief. _What kind of question was that? Is she talking about Mako? But that question makes no sense!_ until two metal fleas that were in her shoulders ran through like mercury on the sensitive skin of her breasts. Before she had the time to react, they went to her nipples and pinched them hard.

Korra whimpered. Red-hot pain flooded her. She was a warrior, and accustomed to the pain of blows and injuries, but not like that, not while bound and helpless. She squirmed, but in vain.

'Did you not hear me?'

The pressure increased, and sharp edges started piercing her skin. It would break soon. Korra nodded shakily, and the pressure in her nipples receded. The drops stayed, however, and kept pinching her rhythmically.

'And did you like it? Did you enjoy it, giving your body to the boy to let him do as he pleased?'

Kuvira's gloved hands went her breasts and pulled at them, teasing her sore nipples until they were hard.

Korra nodded again, and memories came to her. Mako, who had been her first and her only, with the hungry eyes and the rough hands. At the beginning, just looking at him used to fill her belly with a molten fire, promises of pleasure that at the end he failed to deliver. Against her will, an echo of the fire she had felt for him came back.

Then, another drop of metal went into her legs and started tracing the creases of her sex. The sensation was almost unbearable. Korra protested, knowing that no help would come. She felt Kuvira's weight on the bed, moving around, and kneeling between her knees. She bent over her, and for a moment Korra could feel the weight of the Great Uniter and her armor pressing on her belly and her breasts, making her flinch. She felt the leather gloves fall to her side.

Kuvira's hands were rough, the hands of a metalbender, as they grabbed her hips and forced them up. She slipped her hands under her knees, spreading her legs open.

'Was it like this?'

Just as Korra made a breathless assenting gesture, something cold and hard poked her into the opening of her pussy, and slowly started entering her. A rod, some kind of fake member that the other had fashioned to look like a man. She wanted to argue, to plead for her to stop, but only moans left the gag.

'So nice and wet, I did not have to grease it up' whispered Kuvira in her ear. 'You wanted this all along, didn't you'

The rod was cold as ice, so different from Mako's cock. She was using it differently, too, going in a little way and receding, entering her deeper and deeper every time, until it was all in. Then she started fucking her, hard and fast. At the same time, the metal drop between her legs seemed to have found a place in the little nub hidden in the creases of her skin, and was moving in circles, teasing it.

Korra stiffened and turned her head away, but she could not avoid her skin tingling with arousal nor her heart beating faster. As if of their own accord, her hips started moving with the thrusting, driving it deeper and deeper into her. The pressure was building up inside her, her cries louder, despite not wanting Kuvira to know she was enjoying it, when everything stopped.

She tried to mute a frustrated sound, to no avail. Kuvira moved away, leaving the member inside her, and Korra could hear the ruffle of clothes. What was happening? Then, the other moved to the top of the bed and touched her lips lightly. The gag changed shape again, from a cylinder to a ring that surrounded her tongue and forced her jaws open. Then, Korra felt the other going over her and sitting on her face.

The pressure at the beginning did not let her breathe, and she panicked, but Kuvira's hands held her head in place, in the warm spot between her legs. Her nose and cheeks rubbed against the other's coarse pubic hairs. And then the gag started forcing her tongue to move.

It took her a while to realize what was happening, because she had only heard of the practice as a joke, one of the whispered perversions that pubescent girls exchanged before healing class. Despite her humiliation and unbelief, the gag did not let her stop.

The Great Uniter tasted like salt and sweat, just like she smelled. Her skin was soft and wet down there. _Just like mine_, thought Korra regretfully.

The rod started thrusting again, and the drop in her clitoris began pulsating. Somehow, this time their effect seemed amplified. To her shame, she found herself moaning louder and louder, pleading for more with mangled words, and Kuvira responded by pulling her head to push her harder into her crotch, staining her face.

The Avatar came in a spasm that shook her whole body, tied into the bed, thirstily licking and sucking into her enemy's sex. Kuvira came shortly afterwards, with a short grunt, and fell to the side.

Korra was trembling in the aftermath, gasping for air, when the voice of Kuvira went into her ears.

'I have always wanted to do this to you, you know. Since the very beginning.'

Korra did not react, until the voice came again.

And now we are going to repeat, this time from behind.'

Korra did never know how many hours she was in that room, or how many times she was forced to come in Kuvira's hands. The other moved her like a puppet, relentless, forcing her aching body in increasingly uncomfortable positions, stopping only on a couple of occasions when she released her tongue for some minutes and forced water down her throat.

She came for the last time on her knees, with her head between Kuvira's legs, as she fell the metal band in her eyes fall with a clank. After the hours in the dark, even the tenuous light from a candle stung. She felt her shackles shift and change again, to the shape they originally were, but she did not move. She was exhausted, and sore. Her knee was throbbing, a dull ache that the position was worsening.

After some minutes, she opened her eyes and saw Kuvira completely dressed again in front of her, fixing her boots. The room, that she had not seen before, was almost empty, with a single bed and the stool she had tripped on hours before.

Someone knocked at the door, and Kuvira opened. There were four men, dressed in the uniforms of medium-ranking officials. The one who was in front looked at Kuvira, then at Korra, and his lips curled into a smile.

'Did you already install the furnishings?' asked Kuvira without ceremonies.

'Yes, Great Uniter' the man bowed.

'Fix her up and prepare her as you usually do." she wrinkled her nose 'Wash her well.'

'Shall we feed her? It's late.'

'No, not that. I will take care of it myself later. Thank you, Karrok.'

The four men walked with her in the garden. The night had brought a temperature drop, as always in Zaofu, and Korra's teeth were chattering against the metal, until they went into the big building that used to be Suyin's house.

'Who would have said, the Avatar has a nice rack!' said the youngest of them.

'Good that she has, she is not useful for anything else!' exclaimed another, and the other three started laughing. Korra closed her eyes, and tried to make herself as small as possible.

'Did you see how our Lady took her down the first time? Amazing! When I saw her face, I thought she was going to fuck her

One of the men behind her grabbed her suddenly, and, before she could react, he shoved his hand between her legs and slipped two fingers into her pussy.

'Ha, look at how wet she is! Our Great Uniter really gave her what she wanted!'

They went into what Korra recognized as one of the big, baroque bathrooms of Suyin's place, and she knew what would happen. Resigned, she let the men take her limbs while they cuff her wrists to chains that had been hanging from the ceiling, then spread her legs apart and bind them to another cuffs attached to the walls.

They emptied the first bucket of gelid water on her back, and soaped her from head to toe, taking especial care in her breasts and between her legs. That treatment elicited another series of muffled protests, that were responded with laughter.

She was trembling with rage. The shock from the experience at Kuvira's hands was waning, and her temper was coming back. She was the Avatar. One thing was to be defeated by a military commander, other was being the subject of laughter by some lowly soldiers.

One of the guards slid his hand over her crack and shoved a soaped finger up her asshole, making her gasp.

'Look how she squirms!' he laughed, and slapped her ass with the other hand. 'Our Lady has still not gotten really started with you! Bigger things are to come in there!'

Something snapped inside of Korra. With a deep breath, she reached into herself, an instinctive gesture to tap the well of power that was her prerogative as the Avatar, and, to her surprise, it was not empty anymore. It only contained a few drops, yes, but in the last years she had already got accustomed with bad conditions. Airbending, the most subtle of the arts, the one that had been the most difficult for her to master, was the one requiring the least energy.

The gush of wind knocked the guard behind her and made another one trip. She tried to maneuver, but the chains were not giving in. The oldest guard rushed to her, and she tried to fight him with another gush, but she could not. There was nothing anymore.

The guard slapped her in the face, hard, making her head bounce. The metal in her mouth cut the inside of the cheek. He kept on slapping two, three, four times, making her teeth clink against the gag.

'Ok, show the bitch what happens.' commanded the oldest. The second guard, the one that had been soaping her breasts, went behind her.

'Ten blows, alternating. Do not hold back, but do not exert yourself. This is just a showing.'

Korra was trying to rubberneck, to see what was going to happen to her, when the first blow landed on her ass. A jolt of pain, like an electric shock, went through her body, looking for a release that did not come. Tears filled her eyes, when another one landed. And another.

The man that hit her acted detached, counting the blows with a flat voice 'one... two... three... four... five', and stopped.

Was it over? _But he said ten_. Korra held her breath, her eyes looking up in a silent plead, when the man walked in a semicircle to face her. He had the instrument with which he had hit her, a long, thin cane. Then she saw the smile in his lips and her eyes widened.

Korra flinched in anticipation at the pain to come, but she could not escape it. The cane swished through the air and hit her breasts, leaving a trail of fire behind them. 'One, two...' started the man again. Every blow hurt more than the other, and she had no way to act, to defend herself. Every one catched her by surprise, hitting the skin under the boobs, the sides, the nipples.

The entire affair was over in less than a minute. Korra contained her sobs, choking on the gag, as the sting subsided and became a burn. The cane had left long, red marks in her delicate skin, and she shook at the agony of her nipples.

The oldest guard grabbed her by the chin and forced her to look upward, twirling his moustache with the other hand in an absent-minded gesture. His voice was matter-of-factly, without a trace of glee.

'Listen, missus. You may not have gotten the news, but you are not the Avatar anymore. You are Kuvira's bitch. One of many. We have orders not to harm you, but we have the right to get a little fun while we work. So, if you try to pull something like this on my men again, first you will be seriously caned. Then, when we are done, we will hold you down and take you. Roughly. The four of us. The high and mighty Avatar wouldn't like it, would she?'

'Good girl' he caressed the curl of her breast, and this time Korra bowed her head and opposed no resistance. She did not want to be harmed further.

The men finished the task without hurry, taking turns to ease the knots in her back and fixing the caning marks and other injuries while the others joked and groped her. She closed her eyes and tried to detach herself from those indignities, but her body betrayed her again. Some moans escaped her throat, and were received with more laughter and salacious comments.

They finished at some point, and made her take some steps to see if her knee was fixed. One of the men, the metalbender, made her lie on her belly and chained her hands together in the back. Then he tied her ankles too, and looked undecided for a moment, but he took a ring of metal, broke it, and fused it again around her neck. Then he made her turn around, took another length of chain, and connected the collar with the ankles, tight enough to make her knees touch her chest. Then he took a couple of steps back and nodded, seemingly satisfied. Korra behaved like a ragdoll during that time.

Two of the men left and came back with a trolley, where they put her, and wheeled her over a corridor. Even though she did not want to know where was she going, she could not avoid it. The officers came into old Suyin's room and left her on the bed, positioned belly down and facing the wall.

'Goodbye, Avatar, I hope that when we will meet again you will be better behaved' said one of them as a farewell, and left.

Korra lied on the bed for a time that seemed eternal, questions circling in her mind. What did it mean, like so many others? What was the meaning of the degrading ritual she had undergone at the hands of the men? Was Kuvira ready for round two?

After a while, the terror in her mind had to leave way to the more urgent demands of her body. The man had left her some room for movement, but she could not stretch. Even with her newly healed body, this position would cause cramping soon. And she was_ hungry_. She had been given water, but refused food, and her stomach hurt. And, above all, she was tired, the raw exhaustion that adrenaline leaves in the body and the bone-deep weariness of physical injuries that not even Waterbending could prevent.

She stayed there, shivering in the cold, and she might have drifted off for some minutes, until she heard two sets of footsteps coming into the room, and the hinges of a door. A familiar male voice then spoke, its tone ringing with surprise and delight.

'Kuvira my love, is this what I think it is?' and Baatar Jr. came into the room.


	3. Chapter 3: strike

**Warning**: this chapter is dark and it is intended to be disturbing, especially the first half (the second is plot).

Something heavy went into the bed. She did not dare turn her head, for fear of retaliation, but she knew who had come. Baatar Jr.? Suyin's oldest had always been kind of a cipher for her. Even if Kuvira was present, was there any way she could interact with him?

'Kuvira, my dear, is this what I think it is?'

The reply came some seconds later, in a curiously listless voice.

'Yes, yes it is. Be careful with her. She has value.'

Kuvira appeared in her vision, wearing the long shirt and linen pants that were the typical Zaofu homewear. Her hair was tied in a loose ponytail. She sat down by a desk and took out ah a dossier, throwing only a tired glance in her direction.

Hands started fumbling her from behind, pulling, poking, pinching. Was this really Baatar Jr? She gulped when the man's' fingers reached her crotch and started exploring her, way more roughly than necessary.

'Look at this, she has hair everywhere! Like a Water Tribe savage! I cannot believe she did not learn anything during her time with us!' A hand turned her around, and she found herself facing Baatar Jr.

Her stomach sank. Every trace of hope she had of pleading with him vanished when she saw his smiling face, eyes alight with excitement, just like a child with a new toy to break.

'So did you start with her? Did you pop her cherry?' he said, panting. One of his hands disappeared in his pants, to caress the visible bulge under the fabric.

'Not really' Kuvira did not raise her head from the documents. 'She had already given herself to that boy from Republic City, that Mako.'

'Ah, pity' his expression changed as if he had bitten in a bitter fruit. He removed his glasses and left them by his side. He took out his cock.

'Darling...' said Kuvira from the other side of the room.

'What' replied Baatar, irritated. Kuvira just frowned.

'Oh. Ah, OK. I forgot." he sounded apologetic. He bent under the bed and recovered a flask of something. When he noticed that Korra was looking at him, he winked at her, and, with a smile, he opened it and spilled some drops over his member.

The familiar smell of Yungam oil filled her nostrils. She remembered it from childhood, as it was a rarity used to treat sores and revitalize the skin of old people. Only when she grew up she started hearing the jokes about its other uses. She swallowed as better as she could as nausea overcame her.

He acted very different from Kuvira, even from Mako, entering her at once and starting to pump immediately. It was mercifully fast. He was so slippery from the oil that she almost did not feel him inside her, only his hands scratching her back and his hips bouncing on hers. She closed her eyes and let him take her, without resisting. Only at the end, when his breath became heavier as he approached climax, she opened her eyes again and started fighting. Was he really going to come inside her?

She fought with what little she had, trying to squirm out of his grip, or hurt him so he would retreat. She could take what had happened to her up until then, all the vexations and abuse, but she did not want his seed inside her.

It did not work. Baatar came with a grunt, and his seed filled her as he did. He fell to his side, ignoring her, and something wet slid down her calve.

She fought back the urge to cry. Meanwhile, Baatar calmly put his glasses on, and Kuvira, with a tired sight, sat down on her side of the bed, still reading her documents.

'Try not to make much noise, will you. I will work in bed a little bit.'

Baatar turned to her.

'Ok darling.' and he looked back at Korra, smiling. 'Now that I'm done with the big things' he said, reaching under the bed 'we can play better'. He turned her around again, so she could not see what he was doing. He was unwrapping something, taking a long time to do it.

Something caressed her buttocks slowly, awaking memories of the previous caning. It was wooden, and flat, and she shrunk away from its touch, but in vain. The first blow came by surprise, with a dry sound. As her buttocks clenched, came the second.

He kept hitting her, reveling in every sound she made, for what Korra felt it was an eternity. She did not understand why he was doing it to her. Kuvira she could understand. The guards too, had shown the petty cruelty of mice playing with a captive cat. But Baatar? He had no reason to hate her, they had barely talked. Maybe she had offended him at some point, when she sided with his mother. Or maybe he just liked inflicting pain.

During all that time, Kuvira kept reading her documents, without throwing as much as a glance to the scene going on next to her. At some point, the blows stopped. The pain receded, and became a steady burning in her cheeks.

'Darling, I am done again. Could you...?' came Baatars voice.

Kuvira's hand traced a lazy circle in the air, and she felt her own jaws stretching. The gag was expanding inside her mouth, making a ring. Kuvira tried to make a sound, any sound as long as it was it was a protest, that was cut short when he grabbed her hair and dragged her head to his lap.

He shoved his cock in her mouth, pushing her head down until his tip reached her throat, and she could not breath. She thrashed, panicking, but his hands held her down firmly. Her stomach contracted.

He pulled out by her hair and kept her head hanging at some centimeters from the bed. She retched, but only bile came out, that felt on the sheets. _That's why they have not given me food,_ she realized. This was planned from the beginning.

Baatar was not completely hard anymore, but he kept pushing, until he was ready again. This time he kept a rhythm, thrusting deeper and deeper every time, and keeping it inside for a few seconds and then receding a bit to allow her to breathe.

Her jaws ached. She remembered one time, when Mako jokingly suggested her to do it, and she had punched him in the shoulder so hard he could not move her arm for the afternoon. The act was a joke, a synonym of degradation, and now it was happening to her and she could do nothing to stop it. Tears, hot and bitter, ran down her cheeks.

'Now the bitch is crying!' exclaimed Baatar gleefully. He looked down. 'You know, it would be easier for you if you helped. Licked a little bit. I would end faster, wouldn't you like it?'

Korra complied, unthinkingly. She just wanted it to be over. Something cold slithered up her leg, startling her. Metal. Korra understood at once what was going to happen, and this time she did not try to avoid it.

The metal lump went to the place it had been before, the little nub hidden in her body, and started pulsating. Despite her will, her body responded again to it, and her own arousal made her moan.

Orgasm came upon her, unwanted. She tried to fight it off, burying her fingernails in her palms, but she could not avoid it. As he heard her strangled sounds, he started thrusting faster, and came a few seconds later, and left his cock inside her, forcing her to swallow.

He pushed her aside, and left to the bathroom. His wife followed him. Her bounds fell in the bed, but she was too cramped to move. She could hear Baatar and Kuvira talking quietly behind a paper wall, and someone came, but she did not open her eyes. She just wanted to become as small as possible and disappear.

The newcomers were two masked women who barely looked at her. She flinched at their touch, but they did not seem to notice it. They dressed her, with a sleeveless shirt and loose pants, not unlike the ones she had worn before, all in black. Then they grabbed her under her arms and dragged her out of the bed.

She was led to an old guest room that had been hastily made into a cell, the door riveted, all the decoration removed. The thick glass window let the moonlight pass through, and illuminated the sparse furniture: a bed, a chair, a desk, a small door that led to a privy. They left her there.

A guard came in and left her water and a bowl of congee. Its sickeningly sweet smell churned her stomach, but she did not move to pick it up or throw it away. She curled up under the blanket, panting, as blood circulated again through her limbs. She remembered Katara's lessons, the breathing exercises that were supposed to help, but they did not did much. The events of the day were played behind her eyelids in detail.

Hours passed. At some point exhaustion got to her, because when she opened her eyes, Her ghost self was standing in a corner, immobile, her arms crossed. She stared for a moment into her luminescent eyes, and the other seemed to acknowledge her, with a tiny smile. Then Korra blinked and the other vanished.

However, the room was not empty. Standing in the place where her ghost was there was someone else, their face in the shadows. The person took a step forward.

'Light this up for me, can you?' a familiar voice ordered, and Korra could see a candle in her hand. Her own instinct reacted before her, making the tiny gesture to kindle a flame, but only a spark came. Her heart beat hard in her chest, and her mouth dried. As she shook her head in impotence, the other lighted the candle up.

The Great Uniter was again in full armor, but there were deep shadows under her eyes, and her skin was ashen. Under the candlelight, she looked much older.

'I am departing this morning for Ba Sing Se to meet their governors, and then to Republic City for peace talks. It will take me weeks to return, I do not know how many.' she made a pause. Her voice was raspy, as if talking was an effort. 'You will stay here for your own safety, and I will leave my personal guard with you so they can tend to your needs.'

Korra swallowed, and sat up. Her vision clouded suddenly with rage. So finally she came to gloat. And finally she was not gagged and could reply.

'Won't you miss me these days? Or you will find more toys to break?' Korra hissed, her teeth clenched.

The other tilted her head and blinked, as if surprised, and sat down on the bed. Korra shrunk away from her, expecting a blow, but it did not come.

'What do you mean? You have been treated honorably. Yes, we had to restrain you when you attacked the team of doctors that were trying to heal you, but that was all. We have given you a guest room. I had you examined twice by waterbenders, the second time by my own personal team, even before they examined _me_, to make sure you did not even have a scratch. You have been given clean clothes, and access to the bathroom, water and food. So what are you going to complain about?' her voice was blank.

'You -you' she muttered. 'You planned all of this!' and shook her head again. Kuvira smiled, and made herself confortable on the bed.

'I knew you were weakened, yes, and Zaofu was mine all along. The last years, Suyin just sat on her ass listening to the tales of how great she was, and she could not be bothered to attend the prosaic affairs of her people. If there was a crime, who do you think they called? Her?' she left out a short and bitter laugh 'No. It was us keeping the streets safe. It was me the one to wake up at two in the morning because the neighbor was beating up their child. And the people of Zaofu remembered that today. But she just refused to see it, just like she refused to know her own children.'

Kuvira turned her head and gave Korra a very thin smile that made her blood boil.

'What, do you think it was me who made him like that? Oh, come on. Seriously?'

Korra nodded.

'We went to school together. He was the quietest, and the smartest. I had a small crush on him. And one day, I followed him home, and I saw him impaling animals. Lizards and frogs, nothing big, but lots of them. He had kind of... a shrine of animal corpses.'

Kuvira stopped talking, and turned her head to the wall.

'He panicked, first, and threatened to hurt me. Can you imagine it? I almost broke his arm.'

'Why... why did not you tell on him?' curiosity was stronger than fear or anger.

'To whom, to his mother?' another curt laugh 'And let a mind like his go to waste? No, I helped him hide his... habits. Started bringing him other animals, finding new places to hide. Little by little, he trusted me. He confided me of his father's engineering projects. At first I thought not so much of it, but look how useful it was in the end.'

Korra sat against the corner, hugging her knees to her chest. Kuvira was talking to her, casually revealing her manipulations as if she was a friend... or someone who could not harm her.

_... was it a way to make her feel even more powerless?_ Just like everything before, was this orchestrated? Korra raised her head and stared right at her enemy for the first time, who seemed not to notice.

'Even if most of the time I can keep him under control, sometimes I have to throw him a bone. Luckily, he is not picky about it. So when the war started I just began to give him scraps. Bandits, spies, undesirables amongst my troops. He turned out to be an excellent interrogator. The war has been half won on the intelligence he and his apprentices gathered, even more than on his technology.'

'So Baatar... is he a monster?' Korra managed to articulate.

Kuvira shrugged, and hugged her knee pensively.

'Insanity and genius run close in the Beifongs. Baatar is just more extreme in showing that. He was kind of infatuated with you, you know? To... play with the most powerful human in the world, for him it was the supreme treat. But I made the experience underwhelming for him. You could not fight, not talk... you were just like all the other toys. He is not so much into you anymore, so I do not think he will insist too much on having you other times. And I will not give him that treat unless he really needs it.'

'Thank you, you are too kind' replied Korra bitterly.

Kuvira turned to her with interest.

'To be honest, I kinda had that idea before. You know that the next Avatar is to be born in the Earth Kingdom, don't you? I could mould him to my needs. However... that would be cheating. I do not need mysticism to have my empire. You will be released as soon as the war is over, or as soon as I get bored with you, whatever comes first. About Republic City, I will do everything in my power to reach a non-violent resolution. It is a beautiful fruit to bite: the culture, the commerce, the tech... I do not want to destroy that. If their leaders are smart, they will acknowledge what is better for them.'

Kuvira stood up and stretched. She went to the door.

'The age of the Avatar is over.' she paused before the door 'Next time we meet you will be on your knees.'

Kuvira left, and Korra was alone, hugging herself on the bed under the gray light of the morning. She tried to make sense of everything she had been told, and wondered whether what the other said was true, and to which degree.

What Kuvira had said about Zaofu and the Earth Empire... it was self-aggrandizing crap, she was sure, but maybe there was a grain of truth to it. And she had left out a veiled threat with all the story of Baatar Jr. Korra shuddered as she thought of the hour spent with him. However, the rational part of the brain was starting to understand what Kuvira was about. She had unwittingly revealed it in her conversation.

She had seen it with Bolin and Eska, with the prisoners of the old Earth Queen, even with Noatak and Tarrlok: the captive loved the capturer, they started twisting themselves in knots to justify the actions of their tormentor, becoming every time smaller in the process. So was that really was Kuvira was after? Make her love her in her own twisted way? Was that why she hurt her, and then gave her given soft sheets and a comfy bed?

He found herself unconsciously in the lotus position, the knots in her chest slowly easing. Kuvira had done her worst, hoping to make her shatter. That was something that Earthbenders never really got, that things could yield without breaking, just like water and air. If she could endure the abuse, stay herself despite the abuse and the insults, so monotonous and unvaried, she would survive it.

Birds were chirping outside. Though cold, the congee was good and sweet, seasoned with cane milk and red bean paste. After finishing, she started with her routine exercises, just like every other morning. She had a fight to face, like so many days before.


	4. Chapter 4

_This is going to be a "breather" episode (hence the title) as it is going to be milder. I am developing the plot in this one, and working a little bit on characterization, so the content will not be as graphic as in the previous. Nevertheless, please bear in mind that this is a very dark fic, so the themes will be similar._

In the weeks that came, Korra started her days the same way. She woke up at dawn, in a habit attuned by years of practice, and before opening her eyes she said a simple prayer to Raava. The message was different every time, most of them just some words long: _give me strength. Allow me to endure. Guide me through the dark days_. As her connection to her chi was cut, she did not know if the deity received the messages, but praying soothed her, and helped her gather the courage to leave the bed.

The routine was always the same. After waking up, she did her stretching exercises and greeted the sun. At some point, two guards brought her a green tea and a bowl of rice. Afterwards they led her to one of the big training yards that used to belong to the troops, and left her there. The first time, she just stayed, squinting to the light, expecting an attack that did not come. After then, she started training, just as she always did.

It was humbling to realize how much of her strength had been based on her bending. She had always thought of her chi as an ocean, a vast reservoir of quiet force that she could tap and shape at will. Now it was gone, and all that she had left was her body. The earth did not rise to meet her steps, the wind currents did not push her in the wished direction. From time to time, she could produce a gust of air to extinguish a candle, or make whirls in her morning tea, but it exhausted her to the point of almost fainting.

Her bending was gone, taken away for her, maybe for good. She mourned it, at the beginning, and expressed it pushing herself to the limit, running laps around the yard until she collapsed of exhaustion, doing pull-ups until her arms gave up.

Little by little, she taught herself fighting moves for nonbenders, from the half-remembered times when she saw her friend Asami fight. She had always felt a condescending admiration for all the regular humans that joined fights, armed only with bits of wood and metal. Now she was starting to realize how terrifying it was for them to face actual benders. She understood better their drive to develop the mecha suits, the electric gloves and the spirit weapons.

When the sun was high in the sky, some guards fetched her again and led her to a bathroom, where she was left alone with a water tin and a change of clothes. They were always identical, black in color, and with the loose cut of gear for martial arts training. When she was done, she would knock the door, and they would escort her to one of the gardens, where she was free to amble for some hours. They would bring her something to eat, and she was free to take it or not. Then, at sundown, they picked her up and brought her back to her cell, where she would get another tea and supper, and by candlelight she could read some of the bland poetry or history books she sometimes found in the room.

She woke up often in the middle of the night, screaming, the hands of Kuvira or Baatar again over her. Meditation helped, at least a bit. She knew why they had done it to her, the way their cruelty had been dosified and calculated. She was also aware that, even if she ever got free, she would carry their scars with her forever, but she could not allow them to take over. She did still have other things to endure.

Occasionally, a groups of guards would jump on her and take her, sometimes by turns, sometimes at once. They always came in groups of three to five people, always masked, and they never said a word. She suspected that they were the same people, but she had no way to know. It would happen during bath time, or upon waking up, most of the times in the gardens. They were never rough; their hands were firm but gentle when grabbing her, they used plenty of oil, and they always tried to make her come. At least three of the guards were female, and they were more skilled than the men, what made it worse. When they were done, her hair was not even ruffled. She fought them at first, as well as the pleasure that they brought, and they would calmly strap her to the ground with metal bands, put handkerchiefs in her mouth so she would not bite her tongue, bind her fingers so her fingernails would not burrow in her palms.

The first attack had happened a week after her imprisonment, and afterwards they repeated it at irregular intervals. Sometimes it would take days to happen again, but one time they went to her three times in a day. At the beginning it nearly shattered her, but she eventually resigned to it. She stopped fighting back or protesting, and she lied on the ground or the table like an anesthetized patient. Sometimes, they managed to make her come, sometimes they did not. She stopped being ashamed at the betrayal of her own body; it was, after all, an animal, that responded to stimuli just as plants and flowers to the sunlight. When they were done, she could recover it, at least for a while. Those nights, she always boxed with her own shadow before going to sleep, to feel back in control. Sometimes her knuckles ended up bloody.

She was surprised by how much of a consolation were the bending philosophies to her, now that she could not bend. The lessons of Katara, so tedious in her memory, came back to her. It had been her who had taught the qualities of her element, the element of her own people. Water yields. It can change shape without surrendering its essence, be pierced with spears and not be harmed. Water can pierce rock, given time and patience. She applied this knowledge to her own life, embracing the old myths and stories she heard in her childhood. She was Water Tribe after all.

Her ghost was present in many of the attacks, standing in a corner at a certain distance, her expression unreadable. She also appeared at random, sometimes in her cell, others watching from over the metal walls. She started welcoming her. Her presence had reminded her of Zaheer and the rest of the Red Lotus, but now they seemed like a bad dream, and how could she be afraid of that, when her reality was worse?

Also, she was lonely. Not one of the guards ever spoke a word to her, or showed her their face. Their treatment was always smooth, impersonal, whether they brought her food, or waterbended her if she hurt herself while doing exercise, or fucking her. Those were Kuvira's elite mooks, or maybe Baatar's, and they lived for the cause of the Empire.

She did not know anything about the war, or even if there was still a war at all. With nothing else to do, her mind would go back to chew on what Kuvira had told her in the last night. _Insanity and genius run close in the Beifongs_. She wondered if it really was that, or if maybe metalbending did something to the soul.

As a discipline, metalbending was as opposed to traditional Earthbending as one could imagine. It defied the teachings of neutral jing, of listening and waiting. Metal was not something to be bent, one had to search for all the impurities and fight at every step to ply it to one's will. It bore the marks of its discoverer, the semi-mythical Toph; her stubbornness and determination.

Metalbending tended to favor a certain kind of people, the obsessive, the self-made. Toph. Suyin. Kuvira. Albeit they expressed it differently, they all suffered from the same tunnel vision. At some point, the need to control crept into more and more aspects of their life, pushing everything else aside. That's why they all accomplished more than anyone, and why all their achievements were tainted by their own violent personalities.

She started finding paper and ink at a table in a gazebo in the garden. At first, she did not touch them, but monotony got the best of her. She did not write anything, because she knew everything would be read, but she doodled with the plume, making abstract shapes. At least that they could not decipher.

Korra had never been one for introspective activities, but she took up to sketching very fast. Albeit untrained, she had a good eye for proportion, and the simple pleasure of the plume scratching the paper allowed her to distance herself a little bit of the horrors she had lived. She drew the faces of her family and friends. The siblings Mako and Bolin, whose similarities and differences were crudely rendered on the paper. She delighted on the rounded features of Pema in contrast with the angular face of her husband. It was a way to feel less lonely.

Most of all, she drew Asami. She found herself making portraits of her friend over and over, picturing her delicate profile as well as the oval of her face. Her resemblance was easier to reproduce than the others, for she could hide any errors or asymmetries with a hastily drawn curtain of hair.

She missed her friend immensely, with a throb of pain that she did not feel with anyone else. Once her rival, in the last years, she had found more and more in common with that prissy, elegant, beautiful rich girl, and she had confided her more than anyone else. She wondered what would she be up to, if she was still in charge of Future Industries, how was she carrying on. Often Korra daydreamed of meeting her again, hear her soothing voice, feel safe again, and she always came back to reality giddy and happy, her cheeks stained with tears.

The first clue that the day was going to be different came at midday, when she picked up her new change of clothes, and they were a different color. Instead of black, the garments presented to her were a subdued shade of blue, not exactly the color of the Water Tribe ceremonial robes, but similar. She put them on, puzzled, and left the bathroom. After eating, one of the guards spoke to her for the first time, in an androgynous voice muffled by the helmet.

'You will have a visit later today. Behave.' as she just stared, the guard took her empty bowl and left.

Her mouth dried. She had not been addressed as a person in almost a month, and it could not mean anything good. She leaned against a tree trunk, trying to recover balance against the panic that was setting in. Someone was coming for her. Maybe she could hurt herself? It would not work, a Waterbender guard would show up to her and heal her without a word. She would be restrained again, until Kuvira or whoever came to torment her.

Minutes passed like agony. This was much worse than the surprise attacks, even than the times with Kuvira and Baatar. This time she knew that something was coming, and she could do nothing but wait until some pieces of metal would appear from nowhere and immobilize her limbs again. However, this did not happen. After a while, Korra heard the ruffle of leaves, and a figure stood before her.

It was Bolin.

'Korra!' he ran towards her with her arms extended, and she flinched. He gave her a bear hug, that she was too startled to return or fight.

'Bolin? Is it... really you?' her voice came out strange after the long time of not being used. This had to be a trick. He separated from her and grabbed her by the shoulders.

'Yes! I am in a diplomatic mission!.'

'What? What is happening?' her head was spinning. _What was he doing here?_

'You don't know? Kuvira came to Republic City, without her troops, just her small personal guard, for peace talks, but Lin said that the only way to negotiate was proving that you were alive and well, and they appointed me to check on you. Kuvira approved.'

'Lin? Lin... Beifong?'

'Oh, you know. The government has stepped down, and the police has taken its place. Lin is now in charge of everything, don't you know?'

They walked to the gazebo.

'So, are you ok? How are they treating you? They promised you would be released soon!'

_Kuvira raped me. Yesterday, a guard held me down when other two had their way with me. And what she is doing to me she wants to do to the whole world_. Korra almost said it, but her voice died in her throat. Her ghost was standing behind Bolin, staring at her with her empty eyes. She pointed at something with her chin, and vanished.

The columns of the gazebo were embedded with metal designs of leaves. A guard was ambling some meters away, seemingly distracted, but Korra had learned to expect the worst of them at any point. If she said something inappropriate, Bolin would be impaled in seconds.

She had to sit on the ground.

'She is treating me well' she forced the words between her teeth 'I have all my physical needs covered. I can pass the time here, painting and watching the plants.'

Her hands started shaking. She could not look up, just stare at her lap.

'I lost.' her voice broke 'I lost and gave her Zaofu in a silver plate. Some days, I think I prevented a battle and a bloodbath, but the truth is that I failed. I failed all of you.'

Bolin knelt next to her, and touched her shoulder. She did not avoid it.

'Don't say that! You did not fail anyone! Opal told me the whole story. You were very brave, offering yourself as a prisoner in exchange for the others. I knew you would do something like that to protect her!'

The realization hit her like a hammer. Had she not surrendered, it could have been Opal and Jinora in her place. It could have been them, prisoners of the Earth Empire. What would Kuvira have done with them?

What would have_ Baatar_ done to them?

'How... how is she?' she asked.

Bolin looked away, and hesitated.

'She is fine. I went to see her because of my visit to Zaofu, but she did not want to see me very much. She was.. kind of distant. I guess I am just happy that she is ok.'

Bolin grabbed her hands.

'And I am just glad to see you too, Korra. We were all worried sick about you. You have to understand that we do not care if you are the Avatar or not, you are our friend.'

Korra composed herself. She realized what a subtle game Kuvira was playing. She thought of all the possible candidates to visit her: her own family was discarded, as they were Water Tribe and out of the conflict. The ideal candidate would be someone from Republic City, with certain notoriety to make them credible. Mako... he would sulk, and try to be kind, but he would be too upset to even look at her in the eyes. Asami, on the other side, would immediately pick up that something was wrong with her. Bolin was the only one who would just be happy to see her friend.

She nodded in silence. Bolin kept talking to her for a while, empty chit-chat aimed to cheer her up. She replied with curt answers, mostly just words and gestures, not a single lie but also nothing that could compromise him. _food is abundant. I sleep in one of the old rooms for guests. I have barely seen Kuvira. Most Zaofu rose to meet her. I am lonely here. I miss all of you._

'So, in Republic City they asked for pictures of you, and Kuvira complied. She said that she would provide a photographer herself, mind if I call her now?'

Korra nodded again, and Bolin called the guard patroling the walls of the garden, with a casual tone that made her shudder. The photographer was another masked guard, who did not talk and communicated with them in gestures. They posed next to the gazebo, sitting down on a tree, and just standing by an ivy-covered wall.

The sun was going down, and the temperature dropped. Two guards came closer, not talking, but standing next to the door with the obvious message that she had to leave soon to her room.

'I guess I have to go now, Bolin. My nannies will not allow me to stay up late.' she forced a joke. 'Will I see you again tomorrow?'

'Unfortunately not, the visit was just an afternoon. I had instructions to just see how you were doing, and I had to become very insistent so they allowed me to actually spend some time. I hope Kuvira will release you soon.' he made a pause and looked down. 'She is not so unreasonable, you know? I think she does actually regret treating you as a prisoner.'

'I... I do not know, Bolin. Kuvira is a very complicated person. Please beg the others to proceed with caution in the negotiations.' she did not dare to say anything more specific.

They embraced awkwardly. Before she left, the masked photographer leaned to show them the pictures, and then gave them to Bolin. Korra grabbed one. She expected to see her face as she saw herself: a defeated girl with haunted eyes. However, she saw something very different.

The face that looked back at her was a striking young woman, wearing simple but well-fitting clothes. She smiled, a honest smile that showed her teeth, and her posture was relaxed. She looked tanned and well-fed, and she had obviously been working out. She was surrounded by her own crude art.

The Korra in the picture looked more like a guest than like a prisoner.

Those pictures would be published in Republic City. Kuvira would gain the reputation of being a merciful and honorable enemy. She had been played again.

Bolin hugged her again as he was leaving; a long, sincere hug that she tried to reciprocate. As the guards escorted him, he bid farewell with a sentence he had used before with her.

'I will be back soon! You're the smartest, funniest, buffest, toughest, talentedest, incrediblest girl in the world!' the words repeated in a bitter echo in her head for the days to come.


End file.
